Character

“Character is like a tree and reputation like its shadow, the shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.”

Abraham Lincoln

          How often do you evaluate and assess the world you inhabit? People tend to go through life accepting most things at face value, but people also tend to label other people and things according to their reputations and/or appearance, rather than on what and who they truly are (their essence).

Ralph Waldo Emerson stated clearly that character is like an acrostic, for if you read it forward, backward, or across, it still spells the same thing. The Swedish actress, Ingrid Bergman, once said that she had no regrets for she would not have lived her life the way she did if she had worried about what people were going to say about her. Her reputation was secondary to that of her character, she, therefore, did not get bothered by other people’s opinions.

Some people are of the opinion that it is not until you’ve lost your reputation that you will realize what a burden it was or what freedom really is. The only thing that endures is one’s character. Even O.J. Simpson said that fame and wealth is an illusion, but this is not the case when it comes to an all-enduring character. Through life people will draw many opinions about you as a person; these may either be distorted or true opinions.

I think that we should make it a point in life to focus on the tree and not on the tree’s shadow. Let us value and address the essence of one’s character and not the shadow of the reputation as we label it to be.

My character is what I am

my reputation is only a shadow,

so if it is ME you wish to know

then discard the shadow as a scam.

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